The Deal Sheet
Penn National Gaming started construction on the $225M Plainridge Park Casino in Plainville on Friday, the first and only slots parlor the state’s 2011 gambling law allows. (Anybody wanna take bets on when they finish? We'll take action on anything.) The company is unbowed by this market’s high barriers to entry. It deals with strict regulatory laws nationwide, spokesman Jeff Morris tells Bisnow.
Penn COO Jay Snowden (right with SVP for public affairs Eric Schippers) likes the company's odds here because the 90-acre site is within striking distance of customers in Rhode Island and Connecticut as well as Massachusetts’ high-income locals. On Feb. 28, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission awarded Penn a license that lets it install up to 1,250 slot machines, restaurants, bars, and ensures the survival here of harness racing, a sport born in Massachusetts, Jeff says. (Ben Hur may disagree.) In August Penn, which operates in 17 other locations, started to vie for the license; it closed on the land last month.
The new three-building casino complex will include: an existing garage and surface parking for 1,600 vehicles, a 26k SF renovated grandstand and a new 106k SF casino. It will have restaurants and clubs--the first-ever Doug Flutie Sports Bar among them--a four-venue food court, harness concourse bar, multi-purpose banquet room, entertainment lounge and casino bar. The team of JCJ Architects and Turner Construction expects to complete the complex by Q2 ’15. Penn is also developing a gambling venue in California (Jamul) and two in Ohio (Austintown and Dayton).
Street-Works, the master developer of the $1.6B new Quincy Center project, officially pulled out of the development last week claiming that it’s not financially feasible at this time. But Mayor Tom Koch told the city council that the city will continue to advance the project with Quincy Mutual Fire Insurance as the lead private partner for the initial phase--a residential and retail complex.
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Merrimack Street Ventures, a JV of the Planning Office for Urban Affairs and the Greater Haverhill Foundation, will start site work this spring for Phase 1 of a new $80M mixed-use waterfront complex and boardwalk on the Merrimack River in Haverhill. Master-planned and designed by The Architectural Team, the complex will have: apartments, condos, restaurants, retail, and a satellite campus for the UMass–Lowell.
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Hood Business Park, LLC’s 1.2M SF redevelopment of the industrial Hood Business Park in Charlestown into a research and office complex is advancing with the BRA’s approval of the $25M, 61k SF renovation of 500 Rutherford Ave. This is the first progress at the site since 2001.
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Bierbrier Development started the construction of Needham Street Village Shops at 55 Needham St in Newton, the eastern end of an affluent retail corridor. The 19k SF complex with parking for 79 vehicles will be LEED Silver and ready for occupancy this summer. The team: architect, Prellwitz Chillinski, GC, Bowdoin Construction and leasing, Atlantic Retail Properties.
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Riverbridge North completed construction of a 12k SF child care center, the second building to go up in Riverbridge North village, a 470k SF mixed-use development in Berlin. It was designed by Union Studio and Integrated Builders was the GC.
Gov Deval Patrick cut the ribbon on the newly renovated Yawkey Commuter Rail Station last week. The $15M overhaul is part of the stalled $500M, mixed-use Fenway Center project (above). The new station provides enhanced commuter rail service on the Framingham/ Worcester Line. The station serving Fenway Park and the LMA, is now fully accessible and in the future will be a net-zero energy, solar powered facility. Also in the ribbon-cutting contingent: MassDOT CEO Richard Davey, Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce CEO Tim Murray and Red Sox CEO Larry Lucchino.
Sale
Aegean Capital paid ASB Real Estate Investments $24M for 31 Milk St in the Financial District, which is 90% occupied. In Q1 ’11, ASB purchased the 94k SF office building for about half the recent selling price x from a special servicer after a foreclosure for about half the recent selling price.
Leasing
In a Watertown relo, EnVivo Pharmaceuticals leased 45k SF at 1550 Soldiers Field Rd in Brighton from SFR Holdings. Avison Young’s Jack Kerrigan, Steve Cook, Bill Sullivan, Mark Coelho, and Colin Whitney repped the landlord; Transwestern RBJ’s Robert Richards repped EnVivo.
Assignments
Cushman & Wakefield has been tapped by Chicago-based Pearlmark Real Estate to market up to a 49% interest in 75-101 Federal St, now about 20% vacant. Pearlmark bought the 820k SF two office tower property from EOP in ’07 for $260M.
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Margulies Perruzzi Architects will design Dassault Systèmes’ 90k SF Class-A office space at Northwoods, a new office park at 1301 Atwood Ave in Johnston, RI. Hobbs Brook Management, which is developing the 340k SF office park, has also engaged MPA to renovate the entire complex.
People
Wood Partners has promoted Mark Theriault, a veteran multifamily construction manager, to director of construction for the Northeast. He'll lead the design, estimating and construction of all projects in the region from Wood Partners’ Boston office. During his career, Theriault has managed all types of residential construction, including 5,000 apartments. At Wood Partners, he has served as regional construction manager and has been responsible for all construction activities in the Northeast.
